The increasing restrictions on women in Afghanistan is forcing women journalists to take extraordinary risks to their own safety to tell the stories of their fellow women and girls living under the op...
Zahra Joya
Zahra Joya is an Afghan journalist and founder and editor-in-chief of Rukhshana Media, a news agency reporting on life for women and girls in Afghanistan. Rukhshana was named after a young woman who was stoned to death by the Taliban in 2015. Its reports are published in both Persian/Dari and English, under pseudonyms to protect the journalists’ identities.
Just before Afghanistan fell to the Taliban in May 2021, Zahra collaborated with The Guardian and published the Women Report Afghanistan project to expose how women were being treated in the country. After being critical of the Talban, she fled to the UK where she continues to run Rukhshana Media channel. She was named one of Time Magazine’s Women of the Year 2022 and listed in the BBC's 100 influential women in the same year. She was recently appointed a By-Fellow at Hughes Hall, University of Cambridge. She is the co-author, with Amie Ferris-Rotman, of the upcoming The Vanishing Girl of Kabul (2 July 2026, Hachette).
Who is responsible for the survival of independent media? At a time of acute crisis, this panel looks at the support journalism need to keep operating worldwide and who, if anyone, should provide it a...
